Toy Train?
After a few enjoyable days in Shimla we took the narrow gauge train down to the plains, en-route to Chandigarth. What an amazing thing. Anything but a toy train, it clings precariously to the verdant, sheer mountain sides, passing under 102 tunnels on its five hour journey.
A journey that its been doing for over a hundred years since the times of the Raj. It was constructed for the British, who decamped from the heat of Delhi to run India (!) from the cool of Shimlaâs hill station. A miracle of engineering but also testament to the people who constructed it.
The Indus Valley civilization, one of the oldest in the world, dates back at least 5,000 years. Aryan tribes from the northwest invaded about 1500 B.C.; their merger with the earlier Dravidian inhabitants created the classical Indian culture. Arab in... ... read more 
